Regisford v. Lockamy

Background

Timothy Ricardo Regisford sued Lynn Lockamy seeking a declaration concerning ownership of the song “At the Club.” Regisford alleged that he and Lockamy were co-owners and that Belters Only Production, Ltd., through Polydor Records, incorporated the song into “Make Me Feel Good.” Lockamy disputed that account. She alleged that she wrote and owned “In the Club” and “At the Club,” that Regisford registered “At the Club” without her authorization, and that the later song used her lyrics, melody, and voice.

Lockamy asserted claims against Regisford and his record label in a counterclaim. She later filed a third-party complaint against PolyGram Publishing and several Universal Music-related entities, as well as Belters Only Productions Limited. She alleged direct and secondary copyright infringement, claims under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), claims under New York Civil Rights Law §§ 50-51, and requests for damages, an injunction, an accounting, and a declaration of rights. The third-party complaint was filed 299 days after her answer without first obtaining the court’s permission, which Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 14(a)(1) generally requires when a third-party complaint is filed more than 14 days after the original answer.

Court’s analysis

The court applied the standard for a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim. Under that standard, the court accepts well-pleaded factual allegations as true but requires enough facts to make a requested remedy plausible.

The court held that Lockamy’s copyright claims were barred by the three-year statute of limitations. It reasoned that the central issue was ownership, not merely individual acts of infringement. An ownership claim accrues once, when a reasonably diligent claimant would have been put on notice of the ownership dispute. Lockamy alleged that she notified Regisford and Tribe in March 2011 that she was the sole owner and that “Make Me Feel Good” was unauthorized. Because she knew of the ownership dispute for more than a decade before filing the third-party complaint, the court dismissed her direct and secondary infringement claims in their entirety.

The court also dismissed the DMCA claims based on allegedly false copyright-management information. It found that Lockamy had not plausibly alleged the required two forms of knowledge: that the defendants knowingly provided false copyright information and that they did so intending to induce, enable, facilitate, or conceal infringement. The court rejected Lockamy’s reliance on constructive knowledge because, under the court’s analysis, that substitute applies only to a different type of DMCA violation and not to the provision of false information under 17 U.S.C. § 1202(a).

The court dismissed the New York Civil Rights Law §§ 50-51 claims as a matter of law because those provisions do not apply to works of literary and artistic expression. It also dismissed the requests for an accounting and declaratory judgment because those remedies were not independent causes of action after the underlying claims failed.

Disposition

Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein granted the third-party defendants’ motion to dismiss and dismissed Lockamy’s impleader complaint. The opinion does not state that the dismissal was with or without prejudice. The court separately directed counsel for Regisford and Lockamy to appear at a telephone status conference and directed the Clerk of Court to terminate two docket entries.